


The Edge of the Dark

by layton_kyouju



Category: Layton Kyouju Series | Professor Layton Series
Genre: Family, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Implied Character Death, Miracle Mask Spoilers, Post-Akbadain Ruins
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-19
Updated: 2016-02-19
Packaged: 2018-05-21 14:10:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,925
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6054502
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/layton_kyouju/pseuds/layton_kyouju
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>As knees buckle, arms encircle him and pull him into an embrace. He falls into the warmth, the safety, and everything else fades.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Edge of the Dark

**Author's Note:**

> Hershel Layton is very important to me. The Laytons taking care of their fluffy son after he went through a traumatic experience is very important to me.
> 
> This has been a work-in-progress for over a year and something I have wanted to write about for even longer, but at last it is finally done.

“This saying good-bye on the edge of the dark

And cold to an orchard so young in the bark

Reminds me of all that can happen to harm

An orchard away at the end of the farm

All winter, cut off by a hill from the house.”

~

“Good-bye, and Keep Cold”, Robert Frost

\----

The sky burns with oranges and yellows, carving out the horizon and casting a golden, hazy light over the landscape. Is the sun setting or rising? How long had he been dragging his feet over dry, cracked soil, and when did it bleed into neat cobblestones? Arid earth to lush trees and grass?

He has no idea.

He does know that his mouth is dry as ash and every muscle aches. Hunger passed long ago, reduced to a hollow pang in his stomach. All he longs for is to lie in his bed and forget. Just forget.

Left, right, left, right, he walks on, body like lead but consoled by the repetition.

Two figures stand on the hill ahead. The low sun pours their shadows over the stone and grass. When he recognizes them, the gravity of it all hits him at once, a heavy blow to his stomach, and halts his pattern. Nausea seeps into his gut and throat. He shouldn’t have come back.

The shorter of the pair shouts “It’s Hershel!” and there’s a spark in his chest to bolt, to run and run and never look back, but it’s too late, and he’s too tired. His feet refuse to move.

They draw closer, but his eyes dart to the ground.

“Hershel, what happened? How’d it go?” the girl asks as she meets him. He can’t look at her. “Where’s Randall?”

A silent beat. Then it hits her.

She seizes him by the shoulders. Her fingertips hurt as they dig into his skin. “Hershel, where is he?!” she pleads, shaking him like a ragdoll. The boy still can’t raise his head. He wishes that she would stop jostling him or he really will get sick. Or that he would just disappear. “Tell me what happened out there! Why aren’t you with Randall?! _WHY?!_ ”

He forces himself to look at her, but the words do not come, and they wouldn’t have to. The look on his dirt-smudged face must have said it all. Her hands slide off his shoulders and fall limp at her sides.

An awful hush passes between them. Nothing but the gentle breeze rustling nearby trees. Henry is frozen a couple feet behind Angela. They just stare at him.

The girl stumbles back, her features contorting in horror. She shakes her head, disbelieving, eyes begging him to say that he’s lying. “No,” she gasps, “ _No!_ ”

Hershel’s voice returns to him, though it’s more akin to the scraping of sandpaper. “Angela, Randall,” he rasps, hesitation, why is this happening, “he’s gone.” He closes his eyes and prays that this is just a terrible nightmare. That he’ll wake up in his bed the morning before they left and dissuade Randall from going through with the excursion.

But he does not. Instead he must bear Angela’s wails as her legs give way beneath her and she falls to the earth.

He can’t look, can’t imagine the anguish on her face or the reason for Henry’s silence.

He broke his promise.

The only thing he can do is stand there in the amber light, listen to his friend’s anguish that he caused with his own hands, and recall the question Randall was going to ask her but now would not have the chance.

Much of the day is a blur after that. The sky melds to a soft purple – dusk, he realizes, it is dusk – as villagers filter out of their homes, evening meals paused and nighttime routines interrupted. Not much happens in the sleepy hamlet, but when a significant event occurs, it spreads faster than wildfire. Murmurs wash through the crowd that grows in the center of town.

Around him.

“Isn’t that Hershel? What happened?”

“He looks pretty scuffed up. Was there a fight?”

“Where’s the Ascot boy?”

A heavy buzz humming through the air of overlapping voices, reverberating through Hershel’s bones and ribs and skull. Countless eyes questioning, suspecting. He stares down at the worn cobbles beneath his scuffed loafers.

Henry and Angela are nowhere to be seen.

A voice he recognizes as Randall’s father’s barks at him, going on about something or other, he doesn’t know. He’s too tired. Though, if the elder Ascot didn’t hate him before, it’s clear that he does now. Hershel wouldn’t blame him.

“It was an accident,” the boy hears himself whisper, a pitiful counter to Lord Ascot’s roars. He can feel the crowd’s eyes upon him, boring him through. His friends, his neighbors, almost his extended family.

He didn’t deserve their kindness over these past few years. Look at what it has brought them.

Disaster.

All caused by a ragged husk of a boy covered in dirt and grime.

Another voice raises in retaliation against the enraged baron, familiar and shattering through Hershel’s daze. It takes everything that’s left in him to not burst out bawling in front of everyone like a child reunited with a loving embrace after wandering off at the market.

Two pairs of gentle hands rest on Hershel’s arms to support him as he feels a presence on either side of him. He squints his eyes shut to fight back the burn of tears. He is surprised he has any left to shed.

When had he started shaking?

The new voice continues. Something about him needing rest. That once he’s feeling better he can tell them what happened. Lord Ascot is quiet for a moment before grunting his agreement, though it’s gruff and irritated.

The kind hands at his back guide him down the stone path home.

Hershel’s parents are not people to raise their voices or act in anger. They are kind and caring with warm dispositions and warmer hearts, but they know how to make their disappointment clear.

The instant the front door clicks shut, a flood of questions comes flying at Hershel quicker than he can register them. _What were they thinking?! Why didn’t they tell anyone where they were going?!_ _Did they have any idea how much_ danger _they were putting themselves into?!_ He has never heard them so furious. There are tears in his mother’s eyes, and her hair is unsettled from its usual neat bun. His father’s expression is unreadable beyond the creases in his brow. All the boy can do is stare at the floor and take the brunt of their words. There’s nothing he can say.

“We could have lost you!”

The broken foundation comes crumbling down. Trembling fingertips, chest closing in, the world is going askew.

“I’m sorry,” he croaks.

As knees buckle, arms encircle him and pull him into an embrace. He falls into the warmth, the safety, and everything else fades.

Time continues to ooze on like molasses. A fire begins to crackle in the hearth, and Hershel’s parents sit him at the kitchen table. After fetching him a glass of water, followed by a straw when they discover he is too weak to hold it, they proceed it to check him for injuries with erudite perception.

They ask where he hurts most – it’s difficult to discern, everything aches yet is numb all at once – but by some miracle he hasn’t sustained many injuries in the physical sense: a variety of bumps, bruises, and scrapes. His hands bear the harshest wounds, deep slices carved into the soft flesh of his palms and the blood long ago encrusted onto his skin. Exhaustion, dehydration, and hunger are the greatest complications.

His mother runs a hot bath upstairs and requests that he get cleaned up. “It may help you feel a bit better,” she suggests in a soft tone while her thumb brushes away a smudge of dust on his cheek, a slight quiver in her fingertips. Hershel is doubtful, but he complies with her wishes, and he half-walks half-drags himself up the steps.

The wood floor sends agonizing throbs through his feet and shooting up his legs, but he finds a last bit of strength to fight past it and stagger his way down the darkened hall. The air feels cold and empty. He misses the warmth of the fireplace and his parents. Palm sweating as he reaches for the handle of the bathroom door.

A soft cloud of steam washes over him as he steps into the small room. Transparent tendrils waft through the air thick with water, caressing the tiled walls and floor. The mirror over the sink is frosted over in a thin sheen of white. A tired voice within him admits that peeling off the clothes caked with dirt and sweat is an improvement if nothing else, but it reveals a colorful array of bruises that pattern his skin.

After the battered teen manages to ease himself into the basin of warm water, the heat soothes and relaxes the aches in his muscles, but an echoing pain still resonates through his bones. He submerges deep enough that only his knees and head above his mouth peak from the water’s surface, closes his eyes, and reposes in the silence.

Perhaps he fell between consciousness and sleep or his thoughts got lost in the between tiled patterns on the wall, but either way the pads of his fingers are shriveled when he hauls himself out of the tub. The movement hurts. He pulls a towel off the rack and begins to dry off but stops when the mirror catches his eye.

Hershel drags a hand over its clouded surface.

The reflection looking back is atrocious, a disconnected part of him observes. Cracked lips, sun-burned cheeks, scuffs and grazes across his skin. The wet mass of curls upon his head frays every which way, more like a bird’s nest than hair. He can’t fathom what the image before the rest of the town had been. He turns away, bundles the towel around himself, and limps to his bedroom.

His own room feels foreign, as if he hasn’t been there in years. A pair of clean pajamas is folded at the foot of the bed. His mother’s voice echoes in his head from the night before, reminding him to change into his nightclothes before going to sleep. That seems like eons ago now. The strain on his muscles makes putting them on a challenge, but he manages to get dressed, though the red flannel catches on his scrapes.

The bed before him is beyond tempting, a desire to bury into the blankets and slip from reality, but he doesn’t want to be alone.

Before Hershel has set a foot off the stairs his parents are fussing over him once more. They support his tired frame back to the kitchen table to resume fixing him up. A first-aid kit is set upon its surface and open at the ready.

Lucille’s hands are shaking too much. She passes a roll of gauze to her husband, who sits beside Hershel and dresses the deep gashes in their son’s palms. Bandages are applied to the more minor scratches. The final touches are a massive quilt smelling of cinnamon and home bundled around him and a small tub of water on the floor for his blistered feet. He had not noticed the swelling at all until he looked at their angry red undersides. Over the hours he had grown accustomed to the pain.

A simple bowl of plain broth is placed on the table before him. Despite having not eaten for who knows how long, he can’t bear to think about food. However, his mother’s worried glimpses toward him prompt him to take a spoonful. He can’t discern much of a taste through fatigued senses, but the heat is pleasant, and it reminds him that he has no awareness of when he last ate. It is not long before the bowl is clean.

Content that their son has taken a small step toward recovery, Roland and Lucille sit opposite of him at the table. The distress etched in their faces earlier has been replaced with deep concern. He knows what’s coming. “Are you comfortable telling us about what happened?” his father asks.

Anxiety claws at his heart and lungs, but he cannot put it off any longer. Hershel nods.

The boy relays to his parents as much as he can recall; where they had gone, how deep into the ruins they had travelled. The mummies and other dangers do not go mentioned, for he can sense his mother’s rising terror in her widening eyes, and there’s no need to push her closer to a heart attack than she has been for the past day. In contrast, his father remains as calm as ever, listening in silence.

When his recount gets to the core cavern, he needs to pause. It hurts to talk and to ruminate, makes him feel dizzy and detached, but anything may be useful in the search. “The final cavern was massive,” he forces himself to continue, “and at the opposite end was this elaborate, ancient door. It looked like we had made it, and just a few jumps across a pool of water was left between us and the end.” Ribs closing in, take a slow breath. “The ground started to shake and fall away, and we ran as fast as we could to get across.”

He pulls his right hand out from under his blanket nest, stares at the cuts in his fingers and the bandage around his palm. “I got to the other end first, but Randall fell. I tried to pull him up, but,” it plays back in slow motion, quivering hand clenches into a fist and nails dig into his wound, “I couldn’t-” Tears sting in his eyes. He feels the sickening loss of weight from his grasp, there an instant and gone the next.

His mother’s fingers brush over his hand and take a steady hold. An anchor. The reassurance gives him strength to continue, but his voice still wavers.

“I tried calling for him, but there was nothing. I’m not sure how long I sat at the cliff. I couldn’t move, but somehow I got to the door and solved a puzzle locking it.” It shouldn’t have been him and he shouldn’t have been alone this isn’t what was supposed to happen.

He does not mention the treasure. The thought of it makes his stomach churn. “The cave was empty,” he lies. It may as well have been. A fog begins to tickle at the edges of his mind. He closes his eyes and rubs the pads of his fingers between them to shake it away, but it’s no use. The mist settles in and obscures it all. It scares him. “I can’t remember much after that.” He stares down at the grain of the table. “Somehow I got back to the surface, and I just started walking.” Guilt seizes his throat at a jarring recollection. “The carriage and horse we took with us must still be out there.” That poor horse. He had left it out there for dead. It wasn’t the only one.

The fog mingles with the heat of the sun and the ache in his feet, blurred and lost. In his shock he had forgotten his backpack at some point as well as the carriage. No supplies, no way back. How he managed to get home is beyond him. It doesn’t feel real. A numbness seeps into his skin.

After Hershel falls silent his parents don’t pry further. “Thank you for telling us, Hershel,” his mother consoles, her thumb grazing over his knuckles. He nods, though he’s not sure why.

“Try to get some rest,” his father adds, resting his hand atop both of theirs. If the boy didn’t feel as though he were floating and detached from his own body, he would have burst out crying. He nods again. The couple leaves their son to sit by the fireplace in peace.

Throat hurts from talking, and hands shudder from reliving. Hershel stares down at the bandage around his palm. He retreats it back into his blanket and turns his gaze to the fireplace. Orange and red coils tickling the air, dancing to a chorus of hisses and snaps. Trail through the bark of the firewood with glowing tracks of copper in their wake.

He is not sure how long he had been watching the licking flames in the hearth, but when he comes back to reality he notices that his father is no longer in sight, along with his coat and hat by the door. Hershel turns to Lucille, who is knitting beside him at the table.

“Where’s Pa?” he rasps.

His mother looks up, surprised by the break in silence, before a gentle smile appears on her lips. “He went to speak to Mr. Ascot about what you told us,” is her soft reply, though the clicking of her knitting needles seems to grow sharper as she mentions Randall’s father. Hershel’s chest clenches at the name, and it must have shown in his disposition. His mother’s smile recedes to a thin line as she halts her knitting and rests a hand on his shoulder.

“They’ll find him, sweetheart,” she reassures. “I’m worried as well, but Randall’s a strong and smart boy. He’ll get through this,” her hand reaches up to cup his face, “and so will you.”

Something bursts, like a bottle of pop shaken to its limit, heart pounding, every nerve tight and shaking. “But you weren’t _there_ , Ma!” he chokes. Her hand retreats, and her eyes grow wide. Words start spilling and stammering out of him before he can think to stop. “The-the pit was so deep I couldn’t see the bottom, a-and I called and called for him, but th-there was,” he stares down at the wood floor, his voice fading, “he could be…and it’s all my…” The world begins to warp as heat spills down his face. He should have stayed, should have been stronger, should have should have -

The next thing he knows, his mother is wrapping her arms around him and pulling him close. “Shh, shh,” she soothes as she rubs a hand across his back. “Oh, my poor little Hershel.” He relinquishes himself to her embrace, his weakened body quivering with silent sobs as he cries into her shoulder. Gasps wracking his lungs, can’t breathe can’t suck in air, everything hurts. She doesn’t let go.

When his weeping recedes to a few stray tears and the only sound filling the room is the pops and crackles of the fire, his mother leans back. She looks him in the eye, austerity lining her face and her voice warm but stern. “Now, listen to me. This is not your fault.”

Confusion rushes through Hershel’s head, flooding his thoughts. “But-!”

Lucille rests a fingertip on his lips, then pulls it away. “No, no ‘but’s. Yes, it was a terrible idea for you two to go off on your own like that, and you both should have known better, but this is not your fault. You did the best you could to help him, and the important thing is that you made it home safe and told us what happened so Randall can get the help he needs. That was very brave.” A slow brush of his bangs out of his face and thumbs over his cheeks to wipe away the tracks of shed tears. “Do you understand?”

Of course he was aware of how thoughtless their endeavor had been – the instant his friend’s fingers slipped from his grasp he had reached that conclusion – but hearing his mother give voice to his thoughts stings. He lets her words sink in despite the guilt still clinging at his throat, but he is unable to believe them. Regardless, he gives a sharp sniffle and nod.

The usual kind smile she dons returns to her features. “Good.” She leans forward and kisses the crown of his head. “Would you like some tea?” He nods again. She pats his head once more before rising from her seat and moving to the kitchen.

Hershel runs a blanketed arm over his face to dry the rest of his tears and settles back in his chair with a slow, shuddering breath. Never had he thought being this exhausted in every sense of the word was possible. Worn down to his bone marrow.

He cranes his neck to look out the window behind him. The sky has descended to a blanket of nothingness, clouds blotting out any pinpricks of stars. Dark. Only the moon is able to pierce the covering, but its crisp roundness is reduced to a smoky glow through the canopy. The emptiness and vastness of it all sends a shiver down his spine.

Retreating his gaze to their living room, Hershel peers to the fireplace, but instead of the flames drawing him back in with their dance, his eyes catch on the photographs above upon the stone and brick. He had looked at the excess of framed pictures that decorated their small home countless times, white noise throughout the day adorning the edges of his vision, but something halts him.

On the mantel sits a photograph in a small round frame wreathed in blue and white. A family portrait of the three of them. Hershel could not have been older than six or seven at the time it was taken. It is evident that his younger self refused to sit still for the picture, giggling and having a grand old time as he sits between his parents, who both don smiles. They each have a hand stacked one upon the next with little Hershel’s nestled in the middle.

A swell of warmth fills his chest, and his hand reaches up and clutches at the collar of his shirt. A ghost of a smile tugs at the corners of his mouth.

The click of the front door opening shakes Hershel from his musings. In steps a figure from the gloom. Hershel tenses in his seat, cold prickling up his neck, but the figure gives him a soft smile behind a full beard of white, and relief floods out the fear.

Lucille also perks up from where she is fussing with the tea kettle in the kitchen. She scurries through the living room to meet her husband in the foyer. “What did they say?” she asks, her inquisitive tone edging on defensive.

“They sent out a search party of a dozen people or so to Thornley’s Gorge,” he replies as he eases off his jacket. He places it on the coat hanger beside the door along with his hat. “They’ll make a camp there and start searching the ruins first thing in the morning.”

His wife isn’t satisfied with his answer. She puts her hands on her hips and frowns at him in an almost comical manner. “That can’t be all that happened. You were gone for nearly two hours.”

Roland seems to hesitate. Relenting, he steps forward, murmuring something in his wife’s ear. Their son hears nothing; they are too far and his voice is too soft. Lucille’s stern expression falters, eyes widening as her husband leans back and gives her a somber look. She looks lost for a moment before steeling herself, accepting whatever had been shared with her.

Secrets. Always bad news. Hershel’s heart pounds at the infinite terrible possibilities, but he trusts his parents’ judgement.

They step out of the foyer and go their separate ways, Lucille back to the stovetop and Roland to the teen bundled near the fire. Hershel attempts to look a bit less miserable as the older man approaches him.

His father stoops down on one knee and rests a hand upon Hershel’s head. “How are you feeling, son?” he asks, his bushy brow steepled.

The boy wants to respond, but he can’t think of the right words, so he turns his gaze to the floor. Roland ruffles his hair, and his mustache bends with the sad smile hidden beneath. “That’s all right,” he says, “I understand. Try to rest up.”

He rises back to his feet and heads to the kitchen, leaving the boy alone once again.

A mug has appeared on the table beside him, steam wafting from its brim. Next to it sits a small dish of crackers. His fingers wrap around the mug handle and bring it closer, the heat of the liquid within washing over his face and tickling his nose.

He takes a ginger sip. Chamomile and honey flood his senses, warm and comforting. He picks up a cracker and nibbles on its perimeter, salty and plain as it melts in his mouth.

Lucille and Roland stand behind the kitchen counter. Hershel can feel them glance at him from afar, and he recedes deeper into the blanket enveloping him. Quiet words passing back and forth, faint as the mist curling from the cups in their hands. Thoughts race at what they could be talking about, festering in his brain. He sips at his tea to slow down the building mass of jumbled anxiety shifting beneath his skull, but soon just a few drops cling to the base of the mug.

The storm continues, churning with what-ifs and if-onlys that tingle at the backs of his eyes. Invisible weight pulls on his heart, sinking further and further. Everything is chained with lead but the garbled static twisting and boiling between his ears.

Voices overlap, memories. Distorted as if from beyond the surface of water.

_You’ll always look out for him, won’t you, Hershel?_

_I can’t do this alone._

That rare, calm smile on his friend’s face before the weight was gone.

_No risk, no glory._

The fire continues its dance.

Hershel has had enough of being conscious. As he heaves to his unsteady feet he flops his blanket over the back of the chair. “I’m going to go to bed,” he states, quiet and hollow as he makes his way toward the steps.

His parents are jarred from their hushed conversation and turn to their son. Lucille takes a step toward him and pulls him into another hug. He leans into her embrace, but his arms are too heavy to return it.

“Okay, sweetheart,” she says when she pulls back, though worry still brims in her eyes. “Let us know if you need anything.”

“Goodnight, son,” his father adds. Similar concern wrinkles his forehead.

Hershel acknowledges them with a nod before venturing back up the stairs with weary steps.

The release of sleep does not come.

Every time he shuts his eyes, all he can see is the shock on Randall’s face as he descends into the inky black and vanishes from sight in a pool of darkness. He hears his own wails into the bottomless chasm, echoing off the crumbling rock as he screams for his friend until his throat feels like it’s been sliced apart and he can taste blood. The ragged edge of the pit’s mouth cutting into his palms and tearing the skin away.

That infernal smiling mask taunts him. Mocks him. A Cheshire grin cutting across the foreign metal and eyes gaping and soulless. Grasped in his friend’s hand why wouldn’t he drop the mask, why didn’t he just _drop_ _the damn mask_ -

Icarus flying too close to the sun, crashing down to earth. Tattered wings, feathers, drifting down and fraying. Burning.

It should have been Randall to return, not him. Randall had dreams, aspirations. A future. A fatal hesitation, and Hershel had taken all of that away. An instant. A breath. That was all it took for everything to disappear.

He did this, his hands did this, his hands had _his best friend’s blood on them_. No, friends looked out for one another. Friends didn’t let friends put themselves in danger. How dare he call himself a friend.

But it didn’t matter now. Randall was gone, lost to the accursed depths of those god-forsaken ruins.

All for gold. Treasure. Blood money.

Dark room, dark cavern, dark creeping in the edges of his vision, clouding it all. Locked away with puzzles and riddles. Talons, tearing, clawing away at his eyes and throat and hands. Ink swelling around him, caught up in its merciless current, choking.

Drowning.

Eyes snap open. Every nerve trembles, can’t breathe. He bolts upright in his bed, gripping at his arms, shirt wrinkled in his white-knuckled grasp. Forehead sweating and fingers numb. Scrambling out of the blanket encasement, regret pulses through him as pain radiates through countless muscles, but one motive burns in his mind. With harsh breaths he stumbles down the hall, making a beeline for the bathroom.

So dark, but he can’t stop. Can’t give the talons another chance. His clothes are still sprawled on the floor by the tub. Rifling through his trouser pockets, his hand grasps something flat and round.

He collapses to his knees on the cold tile.

A single gold coin. Ancient, worn, and chilled to the touch. His fingers trace its curved circumference, feel the star-shaped emblem that cuts into the surface. The same as on the wall above the mountain of treasure.

The same as on the mask.

It clatters to the floor with an echoing clang.

Hershel wants to throw it, break it, burn it, _something_ , but he doesn’t have it in him. He just stares down at it, and it seems to stare back. Eternal, cold, and unyielding.

He can’t let his parents find it. He snatches up the vile thing and hobbles back through the unlit hall to his room, then to his desk. One last glance at the coin, thumb grazing over its aged surface, before discarding it into the top drawer and closing it to pitch-black.

An emptiness remains in his chest. The numb, disconnected sensation returns, weighing on his limbs. Thoughts wander to the little photograph downstairs on the mantel. Warm, smiling faces.

He wants his parents.

Hershel ventures back out of his room, arms wrapped around his stomach. Down the hall lies nothing but a darkened void of silence. No one downstairs. Panic swells in his throat. He teeters further down the gloomy hall as fast as he can to the next door down, cracked ajar, and peers inside.

Amber light from the streetlamps outside creeps beneath the curtains and streaks across the carpet. A surge of relief at the sight of two forms nestled in the bed across the room, fast asleep. Wringing his fingers against his shirt, he takes silent steps past the threshold.

His father sleeps like a bear in the middle of winter. Attempting to wake him would be fruitless. The boy pads through the darkness to the left side of the bed, where his mother lies beneath the mass of blankets. He feels awful for waking her after all the trouble he has already put them through, but he doesn’t know what else to do.

He gives the sleeve of her nightgown a light tug. “Ma?” he murmurs, his voice rough and worn.

Stirring, his mother blinks up at him with heavy eyelids. “Hershel?” she mutters. As she looks up at him, her eyes flash open, and she jolts to sit up, worry lacing her features. “Hershel, what’s wrong?” A hand reaches out toward him.

The teen grips at his shirt sleeves. “May I,” he begins but trails off, looking away in shame.

Lucille gives him a curious look, brow creased and head tipped, before offering a warm, understanding smile. “Would you like to sleep in here tonight?”

Hershel hesitates, then provides a slight nod.

Without delay, she climbs out of the bed and steps to the side, pulling the blankets away with her. He takes an uncertain stride forward, looking back at Lucille for permission. Her reply is a soft smile.

The bed is just big enough to fit the couple plus their son, who is still thin and gangling from teenage growth spurts and rapid metabolisms. He crawls onto the mattress and lies down in the middle, his father’s back to him. Soft snores emit from the sleeping figure.

His mother follows suit, sits on her half of the bed, and tucks the blankets over him. “Comfortable?” she asks once he is settled. He bobs his head. Tenderness lighting her eyes, she presses a kiss to his forehead. “Rest well.”

After Lucille lies down and rolls back on her side, Hershel stares up at the ceiling. The presences beside him help to quell the hollowness in his ribs, but something else begins to trickle down and fill the void.

The drip swells to a river, then to a flood. Heart pounds, sending ripples through the rising tide. Overwhelmed. Quakes wrack his body as a fresh wave of fear, guilt, and sadness rushes through him, tailed by a renewed flow of tears. Clutching at the blankets in vain to hold them at bay. Too much. His soul about to burst in two.

A glimpse of his mother turning back over to him. Her lips mouthing his name, but he hears nothing. Their eyes meet. Seeing the distress in his mother’s face, he tries to bury his head in his hands to hide it all away, digs his fingertips into his hair, but she pulls him close.

“Oh, Hershel,” she breathes as he trembles in her arms. The hug tightens, and her head rests upon his, shielding him from the world. Though he doesn’t move his hands from his face, he curls toward her, safe in her embrace.

The other side of the mattress shifts, and the snoring has ceased. Lucille’s head shifts, looking up. Another hand, much larger than his mother’s, gives his shoulder a few consoling pats, then rests there. It seems there are some things that will awaken a bear from its deep slumber.

Sobs tumble from Hershel’s burning lungs, broken by hiccups that strangle his throat. “’m sorry,” he chokes.

“It’s all right, dear, we know you’re sorry,” his mother whispers, trailing slow circles on his back. “Just try to get some sleep.”

She begins to hum, slow and soft. It takes a mere instant for Hershel to recognize the tune. A lullaby she used to sing to him when he was small and plagued by recurrent nightmares: his parents being stolen away in the dark of night by vicious men in suits, a boy with russet eyes.

“ _Layla, Layla, haru’ach goveret_ ,” she sings, carding her fingers through his hair. “ _Layla, Layla, homa hatzameret_.”

In normal circumstances he would have been embarrassed, but a wave of calm washes over him. Familiarity and warmth. His breath begins to steady and his tears to wane. He pulls his hands down from his face and nestles them against his chest. Eyes half-lidded, exhausted, staring at the far wall.

“ _Layla, Layla, kochav m’zamer_ . _Numi, Numi, kabi et haner_.”

The following lyrics fade away, fail to reach Hershel’s ears, but he can still make out the tune through his mother’s voice. Slow blinks and slowing heartbeat. Everything heavy, sinking into the blankets and warmth. Peace.

The melody resonates through the still air. When the end of the song disappears into the darkness, the traces of Hershel’s grief have dried upon his cheeks, but he pays them no mind. The arms wrapped around him remain. Close, safe, and sincere.

At last, the raging storm is quiet, and his consciousness slips away into the silence.


End file.
